Recently in Performances

On March 26, 2015, Los Angeles Opera presented Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro (The Marriage of Figaro). The Ian Judge production featured jewel-colored box sets by Tim Goodchild that threw the voices out into the hall. Only for the finale did the set open up on to a garden that filled the whole stage and at the very end featured actual fireworks.

Gotham Chamber Opera’s latest project, The Tempest Songbook, continues to
explore the possibilities of unconventional spaces and unconventional programs
that the company has made its hallmark. The results were musically and
theatrically thought-provoking, and left me wanting more.

Nixon in China is a three-act opera with a libretto by Alice Goodman and music by John Adams that was first seen at the Houston Grand Opera on October 22, 1987. It was the first of a notable line of operas by the composer.

It is thanks to Céline Ricci, mezzo-soprano and director of Ars Minerva, that we have been able to again hear Daniele Castrovillari’s exquisite melodies because she is the musician who has brought his 1662 opera La Cleopatra to life.

Puccini and his fellow verismo-ists are commonly associated with explosions of unbridled human passion and raw, violent pain, but in this revival (by Justin Way) of Moshe Leiser’s and Patrice Caurier’s 2003 production of Madame Butterfly, directorial understatement together with ravishing scenic beauty are shown to be more potent ways of enabling the sung voice to reveal the emotional depths of human tragedy.

Rarely, very rarely does a Tosca come around that you can get excited about. Sure, sometimes there is good singing, less often good conducting but rarely is there a mise en scène that goes beyond stock opera vocabulary.

The Nash Ensemble’s 50th Anniversary Celebrations at the Wigmore Hall were crowned by a recital that typifies the Nash’s visionary mission. Above, the dearly-loved founder, Amelia Freeman, a quietly revolutionary figure in her own way, who has immeasurably enriched the cultural life of this country.

On March 7, 2015, Arizona Opera presented Dan Rigazzi’s production of Die Zauberflöte in Tucson. Inspired by the works of René Magritte, designer John Pollard filled the stage with various sizes of picture frames, windows, and portals from which he leads us into Mozart and Schikaneder’s dream world.

There are some concert programmes which are not just wonderful in their execution but also delight and satisfy because of the ‘rightness’ of their composition. This Wigmore Hall recital by soprano Carolyn Sampson and three period-instrument experts of arias and instrumental pieces by Henry Purcell was one such occasion.

It has been a cold and gray winter in the south of France (where I live) made splendid by some really good opera, followed just now by splendid sunshine at Trafalgar Square and two exquisite productions at English National Opera.

At long last, Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny has come to the Royal Opera House. Kurt Weill’s teacher, Busoni, remains scandalously ignored, but a season which includes house firsts both of this opera and Szymanowsi’s King Roger, cannot be all bad.

Unsuk Chin’s Alice in Wonderland returned to the Barbican,
London, shape-shifted like one of Alice’s adventures. The BBC Symphony
Orchestra was assembled en masse, almost teetering off stage, creating
a sense of tension. “Eat me, Drink me”. Was Lewis Carroll on hallucinogens
or just good at channeling the crazy world of the subconscious?

Dominic Cooke’s 2005 staging of The Magic Flute and Richard Jones’s 1998 production of Hansel and Gretel have been brought together for Welsh National Opera’s spring tour under the unifying moniker, Spellbound.

Gaetano Donizetti and Malcolm Arnold might seem odd operatic bedfellows, but this double bill by the Guildhall School of Music and Drama offered a pair of works characterised by ‘madness, misunderstandings and mistaken identity’ which proved witty, sparkling and imaginatively realised.

Saturday, February 28, 2015, was the first night for Los Angeles Opera’s revival of its 2009 presentation of The Barber of Seville, a production by Emilio Sagi, which comes originally from Teatro Real in Madrid in cooperation with Lisbon’s Teatro San Carlos. Sagi and onsite director, Trevor Ross, made comedy the focus of their production and provided myriad sight gags which kept the audience laughing.

On February 19, 2015, Pacific Symphony presented its annual performance of a semi-staged opera. This year’s presentation at the Segerstrom Center for the Arts in Costa Mesa, California, featured Georges Bizet’s Carmen. Director Dean Anthony used the front of the stage and a few solid set pieces by Scenic Designer Matt Scarpino to depict the opera’s various scenes.

Performances

25 Apr 2007

Handel Singing Competition Final – London April 23rd

Once again, George Frederick Handel’s old stamping ground of St. George’s Hanover Square, London, resounded last night to the sound of his music as aspiring young singers from all over
the world fought out the Final of the London Handel Singing Competition.

Year on year the
competition’s status has grown and this was reflected last night in both the quality of the singing,
and the quantity of audience there to listen – the place was packed with keen Handelians of all
ages, music agents, directors and critics. Some sixty original young performers had started out
on the audition and knock-out rounds, so the final six singing last night had made it through
against considerable opposition and it showed. What was perhaps most interesting of all was
perusing the contestant’s resumés and noting that two came from Australia, one from South
Africa, one from Portugal and one from Eire.

As with all competitions, what the judges are looking for is not always what is appreciated most
by the audience, but at least the London Handel one acknowledges this with both 1st and 2nd
prizes and also an Audience Prize, given to the singer who gains the most votes in a quick-fire
ballot taken immediately after the singing stops. Last night overall victory went to the only
baritone singing, Derek Welton, the possessor of a fine, robust instrument who concentrated his
fire on shorter oratorio and anthem pieces, with only one excerpt from an opera. His singing was
focused and exact and technically very secure, his wider experience showing, even if he was
rather wooden in his character portrayals. At the other end of the male vocal scale, and
receiving the 2nd prize, was the countertenor Christopher Ainslie who conversely concentrated
on Handel’s great arias for castrato from Serse, Orlando and Tamerlano. His rather elegantly
“English” voice, although slightly covered at times, was complemented by a pleasing stage
presence and flair for interpretation. For the ladies, it came as no surprise when the Audience
Prize was bestowed on the charming Irish soprano, Anna Devin. Her strong interpretive skills
were matched by a strong, secure technique and beautiful vocal tone and she shone in her two
arias from Alcina and Giulio Cesare.

The losing competitors had nothing to be ashamed of – they all sang with credit and commitment
and with great promise for the future: Gilliam Ramm, Joana Seara, sopranos and Julia Riley,
mezzo-soprano. The first named had a big voice, perhaps lacking a little in Handelian style but
impressive nevertheless, Seara from Portugal sang with delightful delicacy and precision, without
too much power however, and Riley seemed to suffer a little from nerves and a rather odd choice
of repertoire in her first items which hardly showed her voice off as they might. Her final aria
from Ariodante showed glimpses of what she may be capable of in time.

As usual all the young singers were accompanied by the very supportive and elegant London
Handel Orchestra, guided by Laurence Cummings.